Platform of the Al-Hakims
The leader of the United Iraqi Alliance, which is likely to have a majority of seats in parliament when the smoke clears, is Abdul Aziz al-Hakim. He is the successor and younger brother of Muhammad Baqir al-Hakim (assassinated August 29, 2003). This is the program announced by the latter on his return to Iraq from Tehran in May, 2003.
Ayatollah Hakim returns from exile to put Islam back into Iraq
(AFP BASRA, Iraq, May 10, 2003) Ayatollah Mohammed Baqer al-Hakim, the head of the Supreme Assembly of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SAIRI) [SCIRI], says he wants to put Islam and Sharia law at the top of the political agenda of the new Iraq.
One of Iraq’s most prominent Shiite clerics, Hakim ended more than two decades of exile in Iran Saturday after a farewell speech during weekly prayers in Tehran telling the faithful that Iraq’s future belongs to Islam.
“There is no time now for me to talk to you in detail about the future of Iraq, but I tell you the future of Iraq belongs to Islam,” he said, committing himself to the struggle.
“Independence is our greatest priority … Iraqis must be able to decide on their future, something they have not been able to do up to now,” he said . . . Hakim called in a recent statement for “the rules of Sharia (Islamic laws) to be put in place and integrated into the social and political life of a future Iraq.”
In an interview with Iranian state radio broacast Saturday, he said “all of the people of Iraq” can realize their aspirations for “reconstructing and creating a developed and independent country under the banner of Islam.”
. . . When the US-led invasion began, Hakim declared the war to be “against the interests of the Iraqi people” and called on Iraqis to remain neutral.
He even threatened armed resistance against the coalition, if it evolved into a force of occupation and stayed too long. Hakim also faces a delicate task handling the Badr Brigade, the several thousand-strong armed wing of SAIRI [SCIRI]. The disciplined and well-equipped militia was recently accused by US Secretary of State Donald Rumsfeld of being “trained, equipped and commanded by the Revolutionary Guards” — Iran’s ideological army.
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